“Just Ordinary Chap”

Press, Volume XCIX, Issue 29336, 15 October 1960, Page 13

“Just Ordinary Chap”

(Rec: 10 p.m.) NEW YORK, October 14.

American radio listeners today heard Mr Khrushchev describe himself as “an ordinary chap.” He said in an interview recorded last night: “I am a simple man, an ordinary chap, and all I want is happiness for - your country and my country and peace for all the world.” As he left the General Assembly yesterday after tas ■farewell” speech winding up a stormy two days of accusations and table-thumping in the chamber, a pretty blonde radio reporter, Lisa Howard, caught his eye an J he agreed to give her an exclusive intesview. They spent an hour in a studio at the United Nations making recordD Miss Howard told him that his personality was a puzzle to Americans. and asked him what sort of man he was. t> "I am an ordinary man, Mr Khrushchev replied. “I am a former worker. My father was a

worker, and my grandfather was a peasant “I come from a big family. “I am a simple, ordinary chap and all I want is happiness for your country, and my country, and peace for all the world. “My only concern is to be a true servant of my people and do all I can to reach agreement with the United States and other countries on all the important' questions facing us, notably disarmament."

Mr Khrushchev paid his respects to three American Presidents in the interview. Asked about the four elections of Franklin Delano Roosevelt, he said: “I can’t criticise your internal order, your internal activities.

“I bow low to Roosevelt. I bow before Lincoln. I go down on my knees to Washington. But that is enough.” He also described the American revolutionary war as "a sacred war” detailed in the teachings of Marx. Lenin and Stalin as a “fight for liberation.”